Up From Slavery

Booker T. Washington is the author of Up From Slavery, and the book tracks his life from his last few years as an enslaved child through his rise to fame as an educator and public speaker. He depicts himself as a determined person who does whatever it takes to succeed no matter what hardship is placed in his path. Even as a young child on a plantation, he is eager to learn, and he relishes the times when he works in the “big house,” as it allows him to hear the white family’s conversations and learn about the outside world. As soon as slavery ends, the young Washington begins to work in a series of industrial jobs while spending every spare moment educating himself.

At first, Washington resents that his stepfather forces him to work in the salt mines; he wants to go to school and learn as much as he can as fast as possible. After he meets Mrs. Ruffner and attends Hampton, though, he begins to believe that industrial work is just as important as academic learning, if not more so. After starting the school at Tuskegee, his fame grows quickly, and he becomes a

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